One Thousand Thoughts About Church…#862

“It is a marvellous sweet thing, when all as one man hear together, pray together, sing together hymns, and spiritual songs, and praise God together, and receive the sacrament together, all as one man, what a comely thing is this to a  spiritual eye! Every Christian hath a beauty severed in himself; but when all meet together, this is more excellent.” – Richard Sibbes

Booklog (September 14, 2011 – September 26, 2011)

  • Pierced by the Word:  Thirty-One Meditations for your Soul  by John Piper (139 pages): Good. The downside is that there is very little to hold the various parts of this book together, there are very good thoughts but it all seems like a random smattering of thoughts.
  • Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal by Eric Schlosser (399 pages): Even though there is some interesting research, this book is a horrible collection of polemic. Most of the good in this book is already known intuitively by your average reader. And most of the bad, is, really bad. He has a political agenda and attempts to put the worst spin on everything, so much so that even things like efficiency and a desire to reduce margins of error is portrayed as insidious.  Probably not worth reading unless you think McDonalds is the forte of gourmet food and really healthy for you.

This places the running total for books(*)  completed in 2011 at 70.

* Note: For the naysayers, I’m operating under a definition of “book” that includes: (A) a substantial written work which has been officially printed on paper with pages and a cover, (B) an exact and entire audio reproduction of and instance of (A), and (C)  an exact and entire digital reproduction (either in image or text format) of an instance of (A).  Some may tenaciously maintain that an “audio book” is not a book or an “e-book” is not book, while while to a certain degree I admire their desire to maintain a traditional sense of the word, I must kindly disagree. The concept of the “book” has always been at its very essence a matter of content rather than the mode of content delivery, it is interesting to observe that even the staunch traditionalists grant this in the way they use the word “book” at times.

Love With A Dowdy Bonnet

“Shall I tell you the sort of woman my mother would like me to marry? Oh, I know the sort! First, she must be tall and handsome, with red, fashionable hair, and cool, offhand manners. She must never look shy or put out, or as if she did not know what to say. On the contrary, she must know who’s who, and what’s what, and never wear a dowdy bonnet, but always a stunning hat. And she must have a father who can give her something handsome when she is married. That’s my mother’s girl for me.

I can’t bear to look such a girl in the face! She makes me ashamed of myself and of her. The sort I want is one that grows prettier and prettier the more you love and trust her, and always looks best when she is busiest doing something for somebody. Yes, she has black hair, black as the night; and you see the whiteness of her face in the darkest night. And her eyes, they are blue, oh, as blue as bits of the very sky at midnight! and they shine and flash so–just like yours, and nobody else’s, my darling.”

- Hector to Annie in George MacDonald’s Far Above Rubies.

One Thousand Thoughts About Church…#865

“if the Lord accept thee when thou prayest for thyself, or for thine house, thence the greater hope will spring that he will accept thee when thou prayest for his own house and people. And if he doth accept thee for them, he will hither deliver them out of their distress, and thou shall have the honour to be one of those for whose sake deliverance, comes; or, if. he should not grant thy request as to the public, yet he will not fail to give thee thine own soul for a prey,  though he do not give thee the lives of them that sail with thee in the ship. And now you see the best way that is open to you, to as help at a pinch, to save the poor distressed churches of food in this time of their need, such praying as may have its fruit unto holiness in yourselves. By this you may…promote the holiness and happiness of the people” – Richard Alleine

10 Epochs of Church History – Volume X -The Anglican Reformation #6

I’ve been working on recording a volume from the series Ten Epochs of Church History edited by John Fulton.

I’m focusing on volume ten, The Anglican Reformation by William Clark. It is in the public domain, published in 1901 and copyright 1897. I have an actual hard copy of this book

I previously completed:

Here is the one I’ve just completed:

One Thousand Thoughts About Church…#869

“Elders should be men to a certain extent ‘stablished, strengthened, settled,’ not ‘novices,’ whom the elevation to office in the Church is likely to make heady…crotchety, conceited. For very young men and very young Christians  other useful though humbler spheres are more suitable.” – David Dickson

Progress on 1000 Thoughts About the Church

Well, it’s been 53 days since I started this project. My last post was #871 (counting down from 1000). That means I’ve posted 130 of the thoughts in 53 days. That’s an average of 2.4 thoughts posted per day. By the way, the posts are automated, so I don’t actually post posts every day, once in a while I setup an automated schedule for weeks at a time.

Assuming I continue at the average rate of posts / per day,  this project will take another 362 days, nearly a year. That is daunting.

One Thousand Thoughts About Church…#871

“When all earthly glory has passed away, then shall this Church be presented without spot before God the Father s throne. Thrones, principalities, and powers upon earth shall come to nothing. Dignities, and offices, and endowments shall all pass away ; but the Church of the first-born shall shine as the stars at the last, and be presented with joy before the Father s throne, in the day of Christ’s appearing. When the Lord s jewels are made up, and the ‘manifestation of the sons of God’ takes place, Episcopacy, and  Presbyterianism, and Congregationalism will not be mentioned. One Church only will be named, and that is the Church of the elect.” – J.C. Ryle